The Prince, in reply to the vote of thanks, said that “in what he had done and was going to do his intention sincerely and uprightly had been no other than to promote the interests and tranquillity of the country, without admixture of anything personal and without prejudice to the general commonwealth or the laws and privileges of the cities.”  He desired further that “note might be taken of this declaration as record of his good and upright intentions.”

But the sincerest and most upright intentions may be refracted by party atmosphere from their aim, and the purest gold from the mint elude the direct grasp through the clearest fluid in existence.  At any rate it would have been difficult to convince the host of deposed magistrates hurled from office, although recognized as faithful servants of the Fatherland, that such violent removal had taken place without detriment to the laws and privileges.

And the Stadholder went to the few cities where some of the leaven still lingered.

He arrived at Leyden on the 22nd October, “accompanied by a great suite of colonels, ritmeesters, and captains,” having sent on his body-guard to the town strengthened by other troops.  He was received by the magistrates at the “Prince’s Court” with great reverence and entertained by them in the evening at a magnificent banquet.

Next morning he summoned the whole forty of them to the town-house, disbanded them all, and appointed new ones in their stead; some of the old members however who could be relied upon being admitted to the revolutionized board.

The populace, mainly of the Stadholder’s party, made themselves merry over the discomfited “Arminians”.  They hung wisps of straw as derisive wreaths of triumph over the dismantled palisade lately encircling the town-hall, disposed of the famous “Oldenbarneveld’s teeth” at auction in the public square, and chased many a poor cock and hen, with their feathers completely plucked from their bodies, about the street, crying “Arme haenen, arme haenen”—­Arminians or poor fowls—­according to the practical witticism much esteemed at that period.  Certainly the unfortunate Barneveldians or Arminians, or however the Remonstrants might be designated, had been sufficiently stripped of their plumes.

The Prince, after having made proclamation from the town-house enjoining “modesty upon the mob” and a general abstention from “perverseness and petulance,” went his way to Haarlem, where he dismissed the magistrates and appointed new ones, and then proceeded to Rotterdam, to Gouda, and to Amsterdam.

It seemed scarcely necessary to carry, out the process in the commercial capital, the abode of Peter Plancius, the seat of the West India Company, the head-quarters of all most opposed to the Advocate, most devoted to the Stadholder.  But although the majority of the city government was an overwhelming one, there was still a respectable minority who, it was thought possible, might under a change of circumstances effect much mischief and even grow into a majority.